Currently in the ARPG market, many games cannot balance the relationship between random drop mechanisms and looting. The relationship between them is always unclear. There are also many games whose reputation has declined because of this aspect, such as ARPG such as Diablo 4 and Lost Ark. Next, let’s take a look at how the developers of Path Of Exile solved this problem and made POE enduring.

Make The Loot Itself More Valuable

This is the simplest logic. How to make players satisfied with the loot system? Of course, let players benefit from the improvements brought by loot. Devs mainly provides solutions from two aspects.

1. Simplified Improvement For Loot Affixes Values

Many players don’t like complicated affixes on loots. They don’t even understand what these affixes mean, things like add +2% to some random thing. If players cannot notice the buff improvements from the loot gained through hard work and repeated defeating monsters, players will gradually give up chasing the game in the long run, because such games cannot satisfy players’ needs for loots. Compared with loots with complex and weak affixes, those that directly show that carrying it can +30% damage are obviously more popular with players. No matter what kind of POE Items, such as Unique Belts, Unique Bows, Unique Gloves or Unique Rings, etc. Because they can feel the improvement brought by this loot when they carry it when they get the loot. This is the thrill that players are chasing. Of course, I also understand what those who make complex affixes think. They may think that such a design will make their game very advanced, but being advanced means that it will distance itself from players. Players will gradually become derailed, and the game will be destined to fail or become tepid. The key to loot is to capture players’ dissatisfaction with damage increases and buffs. Of course, the improvement brought by looting cannot be too powerful. This will destroy the balance in the game. Over time, the damage may overflow, and players will not be able to experience any difficulty in the game. So the devs came up with a second solution in the loot system.

2. Coordinate New And Old Versions Of Loot

Devs conducted research on World of Warcraft’s loot and found that the new loot that appears in the new expansion of World of Warcraft is much better than the previous loot. WoW may hope that this will allow players to pursue the development of the game more, but the disadvantage of this is that it will make the loot once gained useless, thus making players gradually feel empty. From the perspective of POE’s devs, all loots are in the same mechanism, whether they are new or old. Their strengths should be relative, and the benefits they bring should be balanced rather than exaggerated. Make every piece of good equipment you have worked hard to gain effective enough, instead of your old loot being forgotten in your backpack when new loot appears. It is precisely because of this decision that players will have a stronger and stronger sense of accomplishment as they continue to play. They can choose appropriate trophies to improve themselves according to different situations. At the same time, this also enhances transactions between players, as well as concise and stable transaction prices. After all, if a loot that is too strong appears, its price will definitely be so high.

More Reasonable Drop Rate

In addition to adjusting the loot, the devs also conducted a lot of tests on the drop rate of the loot, and finally presented a boss-killing experience that can satisfy players. Devs brought the models into Excel for repeated testing and made about 100 maps in total. Finally, we got a result that allowed everyone to gain an effective experience in killing the boss. Using Excel to calculate probability is actually a very primitive approach, but it is very effective and certain. If this is done, the devs will feel irritated, not to mention how much better the player experience will be. I think this is the most sincere approach and the change it brings to everyone is also the most obvious.

The above is one of the most important reasons for Path Of Exile’s enduring popularity. Of course, if a game wants to develop in the long term, it is not enough to only focus on this aspect. Therefore, the devs also made an important decision in terms of game mechanics: regular reset.

Regular Reset

Many people may be surprised to see this. People may wonder, wouldn’t this result in many players being lost? Or wouldn’t do so mean that the players’ hard work has been wasted? But none of this happened.

The team led by Jonathan Rogers claims to start a three-month season and reset it every season. It can be said that this model is very bold. In this way, the game becomes staged. The beginning of the season is the starting point, and the end of the season is the focus. I think it’s actually quite fun to do that. Next are questions you may ask.

Q: Why Reset It Regularly?

Because regular resets will bring in numerous new players. Conventional RPGs all have a shortcoming, which is that new players cannot be inserted in the middle and cannot be integrated into the game progress. This makes the game exclusive. New players who are interested in this game may choose not to play if they find it difficult to keep up. Only old players are left in the game, and they may give up on the game at any time. The advantage of regular resets is that players can participate at any time, and the gap with old players will not be too big. In this way, a relatively large player base will gradually be formed, and the scope of the game’s attempts will be broader. This is an effective method that devs have discovered to keep games evolving.

Q: Will Regular Resets Cause Many Old Players To Quit?

Of course not. This is actually a completely new way of playing. When we reset every three months, what we bring is not a disappointment to the hard work of the old players, but a reward, because every reset will allow the old players to gain new experiences and new experiences from the new season. Content. This is also a change made by the devs based on the shortcomings of conventional RPGs. In the later stages of many RPGs, players will feel bored with the gameplay and content of the game after everything has reached a certain level. The frequency of updates every three months is not too fast, which can keep players fresh and stimulate their desire to explore the game.

The devs at Path Of Exile have put a lot of thought into the sustainable development of the game. The results explored are bold, innovative and proven to be effective. They captured the needs of players and the common problems of current RPG games, and transformed them into their own characteristics. It can be said that innovation and courage are important reasons for POE’s enduring popularity.